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Anniversary

Having celebrated a strange anniversary - more time spent in the US than in Russia - I rather suddenly realized that I am "inostranka" ("foreigner") no more, neither literally nor figuratively (the Dovlatov allusion). The cultural divide now seems bigger on the other side - the endless role of women debates, gay rights, cheating, piracy, interest in Russian vs. US politics, even music and books, where I constantly feel easier to connect with my peers on the US side than having to convince "my own" of my "non-Russian" views.

The last drop? Last weekend we had a case about the Russian Ice-Cream industry (Ice-Fili, the maker of Lakomka, in particular), and everyone expected me to weigh in with real first-hand knowledge. I rose to the occasion and blabbered something, but felt very uncomfortable about it - I knew nothing about Ice-Fili and suddenly did not even feel justified speaking as a former Russian/Soviet native.